the lights across the water
by the-fire-petrova
Summary: "The world you're looking for only exists from the outside. The only reason I survive in it is because I always knew it was empty." Jennifer Humphrey only ever wanted two things- Acceptance, and Nathaniel Archibald. The story of J from the very beginning to the very end, and every beautiful, dark, tragic moment in between. Rated M for later smut, and adult situations.
1. Just My Name Would Be Enough

_-We're Humphreys, Dad. Not exactly royalty uptown._

_ -You okay with that?_

_-No, but I'm used to it. _

She's seen him before. Who hasn't? Displayed in the depths of New York newspapers, just like all the rest of them were. Paraded around on Blair Waldorf's pretty little arm for all of Constance Billard (and The Upper East Side) to see.

She holds a similar obsession that Dan holds for the beautiful blonde girl called Serena who ran away to Connecticut and never came back.

She daydreams about Nate Archibald because it lets her escape the life where her parents are still married but live apart, never speaking and her Dad is falling deeper and deeper still. The life where she sits alone at a bench in the school courtyard, eating the same brown-bag lunch in the same coat she's worn for the past month or so while she watches her classmates comment and squeal over each other's new designer purchases as they hustle past, in a hurry to reach the Met steps, where they will sit in Blair Waldorf's shadow and gossip greedily over fifty dollar salads they barely touch.

The only thing she wants as much as she wants Nate Archibald is to get _in. _

One would serve well in causing the other though, she decides.

But Nate belongs to Blair, just like a lot of other things belong to Blair. He's her favourite accessory, her shining jewel in her collection of Cartier wristwatches, custom-made couture direct from her mother's atelier, and the preppy little embellishments she adorns her Constance uniform with- including her infamous headbands, nestled amidst silky chocolate locks in such a crown-like fashion.

She's sat at one of those little tables on the train back from Hudson to Manhattan, her hand painfully protesting as she addresses yet another invitation.

_Kiss On The Lips. _It sounds sexy and dangerous and beautiful and very Upper-East-Side. It doesn't sound anything like her at all. Not that she cares. She's going, and that's all that matters.

They arrive at Grand Central and her Dad is waiting to greet them. There's some awkward small talk about her Mom, but Dan bats the conversation away and Jenny glances up at him gratefully.  
As she readjusts her duffel bag on her shoulder and falls into step with her Dad, she sees Serena, because it would be impossible _not_ to spot her, gliding effortlessly through the cavernous building, small tan leather suitcase in hand, unintentionally drawing in every pair of eyes in the place.

Jenny wonders how she fits all her clothes in there, because Serena is _Serena_ and she has an awful lot of clothes. Then she reminds herself that Serena had been at Hanover Boarding School, where it was probably very acceptable to wear the same thing again and again, if you were wearing clothes at all. Plus, Serena isn't Blair, who could never wear the same thing twice without worrying if people will start getting bored with her.

Jenny finds it strange for someone who's position in the _In-_Crowd is so concrete, to have such a lost sort of look about her as her eyes dart around the noisy train station.

Behind her, a hopeful sort of expression has appeared on her brother's face, and Jenny finds herself smiling.  
For once, things couldn't have worked out better. And if she could help it, it was going to carry on that way.

And it did.

By the end of the following day, Dan managed to wrangle a date with Serena.  
She still tells herself, if it wasn't for her and her subtly manipulative manner, Dan and Serena may have never even spoken two words to each other.  
But they did in the end, and then he and Jenny are stood in front of the mirror next to her Dad's jukebox and she's wearing these gorgeous ballerina-esque shoes and a black dress that she made herself. It isn't Pucci or Prada, of course it isn't, but that doesn't matter because suddenly she looks a lot older and she's on her way to her first Upper East Side party and her brother's on his way out to a Lincoln Hawk gig, of all things, but with Serena nonetheless.

She sees _him_ there, of course she does, but Blair's clinging to his arm so possessively she doesn't dare attempt talking to him, and then Chuck Bass is there, still wearing that hideous but nevertheless appealing scarf draped in a purposefully careless manner around his tuxedo-clad shoulders. She decides that he'll do.

When he kisses her, ten minutes and a flight of stairs later, she feels a pang of regret, because there goes her first kiss and she'll never get it back, it's been stolen from her by a handsome, arrogant asshole who won't remember her name tomorrow.

But after another twenty minutes and three nervously-gulped glasses of champagne, she can't help but feel a small portion of satisfaction, when he wraps his scarf around her shoulders and his kisses turn deeper, hungrier.

Then his scarf has been knocked to the floor and he's backing her up the stairs, his hands groping at her wildly.

Chuck Bass wants her.

And it's enough just to feel wanted, for a moment.

But she doesn't want to be just another worthless fuck to him, pressed against a cold wall on some rooftop. _He won't remember her name tomorrow._

Maybe that's what makes her moan out, "Stop," in an embarrassingly whiny voice, and begin to squirm beneath him.

But then Dan arrives and punches Chuck square in the face and Serena of all people is hugging her tightly. And Jenny feels like she belongs somewhere for a second, and feels the rush of satisfaction that comes when she knows Chuck won't be forgetting her anytime soon.

They'll all be talking about this in the morning. They all saw Dan and Serena escort her from the party. And because _he_ is one of _them, _maybe he'll know who she is soon.

And so when they get home and Dan is asking her if she's okay every ten minutes, she says she's fine with complete honesty.

* * *

Before long, she's earned the respect of Blair Waldorf and even Gossip Girl. A hard feat, but she manages it.

Dan's been managing it just as well as her, but not without her help. She helps him, because being in with Serena is just as helpful as being in with the In-Crowd, because Serena _is_ the In-Crowd. And Serena needed at least _one_ member of the Humphrey family to not be so socially awkward, like her brother tended to be.

The biggest turnaround happened when she got invited to Blair's annual sleepover. She felt so out of place she felt sick, but she pushed through, like she had been the past couple weeks ever since one of Blair's posse noted her excellent calligraphy.

By the end of the night, she'd _won_ a legendary game of Truth Or Dare, recognition and several items of Eleanor Waldorf finery. Not to mention a post on Gossip Girl, comparing her to Blair Waldorf herself.

For the first time, Jenny is starting to feel like she exists in the same universe as the rest of the girls at Constance Billard.

The next day, she returns to acting as Blair's little servant, but she doesn't mind, because at least Blair and all those other girls know her name.

She gets into the masquerade party with Vanessa's help and she's never felt so _bad_, defying Blair's direct orders like that.

She sees _him_ again and receives the usual butterflies-in-the-stomach effect, but she knows to stay away from him, because she knows that wherever Nate Archibald is, Blair Waldorf won't be too far away, and if she doesn't want anyone knowing she's there, it's Blair.

So she accidentally on purpose runs into Chuck again and why not have a little fun, she thinks? He's without the goddamn scarf this time- perhaps he's trying to maintain a little secrecy in his appearance, to little avail- But of course she still knows it's him. He's wearing a smarmy little bow tie and a _red suit._

She's braver than she was at _Kiss On The Lips, _brave enough to manage getting him stripped down to his red plaid boxers and leave him stranded, high and dry on the icy rooftop.  
What is it with them and rooftops, she wonders?

When she and Serena swap masks and she shrugs on the fluffy black arm-wrap Serena offers, the last thing she expects is to be ambushed by _him_ on her way out of the Ladies' Room.

Then he's pressed up against her back, all warm and solidly-muscled and his hands vice grips around her elbows. All she can think is 'Oh my god,' and she even lets those words slip between her lips under her breath. She's so shocked, she doesn't even register what he's saying, doesn't register it until much later when she's at home in bed beneath a pink duvet, over-analysing the fifteen-second scenario.

All she knows in that moment is that he must think she's Serena. And she doesn't care if he thinks that, just to have a fraction of time where he's touching her like he loves her.

Then he whispers, "And if you don't stop me, I'm going to kiss you,"

She doesn't stop him.

He spins her around and she's pulled flush against him and then his lips are on hers, just for a moment. Soft, warm, unyielding. She can't help the tiny moan that escapes her and then she feels the hint of his tongue and she's jolted back to her senses. It's the perfect kiss- of course it is, it's Nate Archibald- but she isn't Serena, hell she isn't Blair either, she's Jenny from Brooklyn and she needs to get the hell out of there. So she does, she rips herself from his embrace and she runs.

When she gets home, she climbs into bed and allows herself to reminisce about the feel of his mouth, hot and wanting, on hers.

He didn't want _her_, specifically.  
But it felt like he did.

And for now, that was enough.


	2. I Was Actually Looking For You

**A/N: A huge thank you to everyone who read chapter one! This is my first fanfic, so I'm just getting used to the whole system. This one is a little slower-paced. Chapters will focus on big Jenny/NJ moments, and other parts will be briefer, like chapter one was. I'm writing furiously as I'm desperate to get to some good post-finale NJ smut/plotlines! Hope you like this one!- Mia. xo**_**  
**_

* * *

_I hate secrets more than anything, you know that._

_ - Blair Waldorf._

* * *

He ambushes her again, catching her when she least expects it. Maybe it's becoming a tradition of theirs, and it makes her happy, these secret little traditions and habits she already notices about them, as if there ever was a 'them'.

There's no mistaken identity in this ambush, either. He's sought her out on purpose.

But he does say, "Oh, Serena, right?" And looks at her like he expects her to laugh, so she does, though she doesn't think it's comedic in the slightest.  
She tells him so with a hesitant, sarcasm-tinged, "That's… funny."  
"Not really, no." Says Nate, shaking his head.  
"No." She repeats the word like a holy mantra, comes off too serious and attempts a turn-around with a witty comment, "Uh, what are you doing in the girls' hall?" It's the best she can do.

He walks alongside her slowly out into the courtyard where she eats lunch.

"I was actually looking for you," Nate admits as they walk.  
They sit down together at a bench like they were friends, (Were they friends, she wonders? No) and she listens to him talking about Serena and Blair and secrets and feelings. She returns short answers. She finds it hard to think when he's sat so close to her on the bench and her eyes are fixed on his face like she's trying to memorise every part of it while she gets the chance, him being up so close and all.

Suddenly, she's confronted with the sight of him producing a box of pricey-looking chocolates and holding them out to her.  
"You bought me chocolates?" She realises out loud, hardly able to contain the mixture of shock and excitement in her voice.  
"Well I know you care about being friends with Blair-" (I'd rather be friends with you), "-and your brother, he's with Serena, and I'm with Blair-" (I know, and I'd rather you weren't), "-and I just really need you to help me out here…d'you promise?"

She's about to nod, to reach out to accept the chocolates graciously, because she wouldn't ever deny him help, especially not when he's looking all cute and needy like that, when suddenly Blair herself plops herself down on Nate's other side.  
"Promise what?" She asks nosily, sounding a little breathless, as if she'd been running. She's wearing a very expensive-looking gray blazer with yellow striped piping and a red headband matching the colour of her lipstick. Very co-ordinated. Very orderly. Very _Blair_.

"Promise… to help me come up with a more creative apology than these," Nate rushes, swiftly passing the chocolates to Blair instead of Jenny.  
"That is so sweet!" Blair gushes, "I mean, I prefer the Gold Collection, but thank you!"  
Nate carries on murmuring something to his girlfriend. Jenny bends down and nervously begins hitching up her red knee-high socks.

She realises that Nate's finished talking to her now Blair's here, and she stands up, feeling rather defeated. Why, whenever something was just in her reach, did Blair have to swoop back in and take it from her? Even if it was just a box of chocolates and a pre-class chat with Nate?

She's leaving the courtyard when she's ambushed again, this time by a far less welcome individual.

It's Blair's voice, not body, which halts her.

"Hey Cinderella."

She turns around, though she wants nothing more than to run far, far away.

Blair's holding up the bracelet she's been looking for since four in the morning, when the realisation that she'd lost it hit her through the midst of shocked, Nate-induced dreams that made her unable to tell if she was sleeping or not.

"Think you dropped this at the ball," Blair holds the bracelet higher with that twisted little smile on her face she wears especially for torturing her victims.

Jenny fidgets with her warm brown coat and wishes she'd worn tights instead of socks.

Her conversation with Blair is more fleeting than the one she shared with Nate, her responses short and stammered. When it's over, she disappears to her Chem class and buries her face in her textbooks, feeling more of a child than ever. She can't wait for the day to end.

* * *

It drags and worsens, however, with each passing minute. She listens to the heated conversations occurring between Dan and their father for a few short moments, standing cautiously in the half-closed doorway of the Loft when she returns from school. A few moments are enough. The mention of a certain mother's affair is enough to turn her stomach and bring tears to her eyes. She blinks them away, edges over the threshold and slams the door, giving the illusion of a far more recent return home, one that did not include overhearing certain discussions between certain family members.

Both of them shrug away her inquisitive comments and disappear into their own rooms and she stands alone in the dining area staring at family photographs that seem to fade before her eyes.

* * *

The next day, after school, she finds herself at Blair's house again, a maze of Corinthian pillars and satin bedclothes and the ever-constant, harmonious scents of hydrangeas and Dorota's cooking. Blair lectures her about the bracelet and 'Her World' for a while and Jenny loiters beside the dressing table, staring at an ornate silver hand mirror much like one her mother used to own.  
"I want to tell you something," Blair announces suddenly, catching Jenny's attention. "Something nobody knows, not even Serena. You can keep a secret, right?"

"Of course," Jenny replies almost mindlessly, because for Blair, anything else would be entirely unacceptable. She's still staring at the hand mirror and she wonders if her mother still has her's or if she threw it away when she moved back to Hudson for the Summer that turned into Fall.

"Nate is planning on giving me his family diamond. It's the most incredible ring you've ever seen," Blair sighs dreamily.  
The weight of Blair's comment hits her like a tonne of bricks.  
"As in… engagement ring?" She blurts, her heart clenching like an iron fist had a hold on it.

Blair launches into some story of how she always knew she and Nate would end up together and all Jenny can think about is how her parents once thought the same. Her parents thought they would spend the rest of their lives together, yet here they were; on the precipice of irreversible marital ruin.

The tiny ember of Nate-generated hope that had flared in Jenny's chest following the events of the masquerade ball two nights ago and the brief conversation in the courtyard the previous morning, were entirely extinguished by Blair's revelation.

"Why are you not happy for me?" Blair demands snappishly, interrupting Jenny's inner turmoil.  
"I… I'm sorry, it's …" She stumbles over her words and once again she's on the verge of tears. "It's just been a really weird week. There's… stuff, with my parents and my family, so maybe I should just… go."

She stares at the ground and can't help but notice how her cheap, Bloomingdale-sale shoes don't seem entirely correct against Blair's plush cream carpet.

"No." Blair hisses, every ounce the reigning Queen. "Maybe you should look me in the eye and tell me what you're hiding… Are you jealous?"  
"No!" Jenny panics.  
"You think because you talked to him _once_ in the hall you might have a _shot_?" Her voice is so silkily vindictive, it makes Jenny feel sick.  
"No!" She yelps again, sounding like a wounded puppy, "Blair, it's nothing like that!"  
"Then tell me," Says Blair, sounding angrier by the second, "What _is_ it like?"  
"I don't want to hurt you," She's crying now, and she can feel her face crumpling like a baby's.  
"How could _you _hurt _me_?" Blair challenged her. She seemed to find the prospect quite funny, as though Jenny were simply some small, ugly blemish on the sole of one of her Ferragamo flats, easily washed away.  
_The kiss_, she thinks desperately. _She needs to know about the kiss. _  
"Yesterday wasn't the first time I talked to Nate," She begins uncertainly, as if Blair would pull out a pistol and shoot her for speaking too fast. "At the ball… He told me he wasn't over Serena."  
"And why would he tell you that?" Asks Blair scathingly.  
Jenny sniffs noisily, "Because I was wearing her mask," She says, her voice quivering. "And he thought I was her." She turns her head to look at her feet again. "He… he kissed me."  
"That's enough," Blair cut her off sharply. There's a murderous gleam in her eyes.  
"Blair… I didn't want you to find out!" Jenny exclaims in an alarmed rush. The words don't fit together quite like they should and she's never felt so horrible in all her life, and then Blair is ordering her to leave, dismissing her for good.

She flees, skittering down the infinite staircase on shaking legs and away down the elevator until she's out on the street, her arm held aloft for a cab. She splutters the words, "Grand Central," through trembling lips and lets it whisk her away down the darkening length of Fifth Avenue.

* * *

The deafening silence that falls over her and her mother on the train back from Hudson to Manhattan is so acute it is almost painful. Jenny sits with her back pressed to the window and her legs stretched out onto the seat beside her. They are so long that her small ankle-booted feet hang a few inches out in the walkway, but it is very early on a Saturday morning and the train is quiet. She listens to music on her headphones and is motionless save for the tiny twirling of the plain silver ring on her left pinky.

Alison Humphrey is different in this regard. She sits opposite her daughter, the seat beside her piled with the shared bulk of their belongings, though Jenny only brought a small shoulder bag with her. Alison is restless, ceaselessly fidgeting and repositioning in her chair, crossing and recrossing her legs beneath the plastic table.  
Every fifteen minutes or so, she wonders aloud how long they have left of the train journey. Each time, Jenny quietly replies- "Not long," -increases the volume on her headphones a little, and her Mom returns to pretending to read the newspaper splayed out in front of her on the table.

She is desperately anxious about her father's reaction to Alison's return to the Loft. When she appeared on her mother's doorstep in Hudson the previous evening, she had finally mustered the courage to tell her the thing she and Dan had been wanting to tell her since July.  
"Mom. It's time for you to come home."  
And now here Alison was, as nervous as Jenny was about Rufus's upcoming consequent actions.

When Alison squirms out of her seat to search for coffee from the refreshment cart, she accidentally nudges her newspaper into Jenny's arm and that's when she sees it.

_His_ face, emblazoned across the top half of the page, flanked by his sombre-looking parents.  
She hurriedly scans the article. Nate's father had been arrested for embezzlement and fraud.

Her first thought is to wonder about how Blair is reacting to the situation, given the tearful discussion of yesterday afternoon. Has it brought the couple closer, or torn them further apart?

Jenny hates herself for momentarily praying for the latter.

* * *

After the initial shock of Alison's return, some vaguely awkward comments courtesy of her brother and several tense exchanges between her parents, Jenny flees the Loft in a similar manner in which she fled Blair Waldorf's penthouse the day before, throwing on an old pink dress in the hope it made her seem just a little more suitable for Blair's event, pulling a long red coat around her shoulders and clutching a meticulously wrapped parcel beneath her arm.

In the cab, she writes carefully on the birthday card she bought at a stall outside Grand Central, encloses it inside an envelope and sellotapes it to Blair's present.

She wrote a PS of the words, "I'm sorry," seventeen times, as Blair was turning seventeen. She knows it's childish, but what else can she do?

She starts feeling a little sick again, the way she does when she's nervous, and asks the cab driver to pull over a couple blocks from the address written on Blair's party invitation she was handed a fortnight ago, long before their fight, so she can walk the remainder of the way.

She's staring at the envelope she's turning over and over in her hands as she walks and doesn't see him right away. It's the loud snap of some car door across the street that brings her back to earth and she jumps, startled.

He's waiting on the sidewalk and she can almost kid herself he's waiting for her.

She is suddenly overwhelmed with guilt for telling Blair about the kiss at the masquerade party. He meets her eyes and too late, she attempts to turn, to run, to hide from him.

"Jenny!" He calls out, halting her, and she releases a faux-surprised "Oh!" as if she didn't notice him, but she can tell he doesn't buy it. "Hi Nate," She adds quickly.  
He gives a genuine smile and a casual, "Hey," and her insides flood with warmth.

"I told Blair and I shouldn't have," She spills out, "I'm sorry-"  
"Oh, about what happened at the ball?" He confirmed, "It's… It's not your fault."  
She relaxes a little and takes a few hesitant steps closer to him.  
"So… how have things been between you guys?" She asks carefully, hoping she isn't overstepping the line.  
"Uh… strange," Nate admits. "But again- not your fault," He reassures her.

He asks her if she's going to go inside. She tells him she was planning on it, but now she wasn't so sure. She realises she only wanted to come to Blair's party to give her the card (She tells Nate she's written, "I'm sorry," about thirty times, in a half-hearted attempt to make him laugh, and she feels a lot happier when he does, because he has a beautiful laugh that shows off his straight, white teeth).

She holds the card out to him, "Maybe… you could just deliver it for me, though?" She wonders aloud.  
He pauses, seemingly lost in thought.  
"D'you want to go… take a walk, or something?"  
_Yes, I would_  
"With you?" She asks, afraid she misheard him.  
He nods his head ever so slightly, seeming amused.

_I would like nothing more than to take a walk with you. And I'm also in love with you. A lot. _She suppresses the thoughts rushing wildly through her head and finds some sense and reason through it all.  
"What would Blair think?" She says. She doesn't know if she does it to remind him that he does have a girlfriend, or if it's because she really is afraid of what Blair would think.  
"Well… Blair's up there." He tells her, inclining his head slightly toward the building they're standing next to. (Blair's party is in the penthouse, she's heard.)  
"Unless of course you want to go… It's up to you."  
She takes a second to process his words and control the happiness radiating out of her like sunbeams. "A walk… sounds good,"


End file.
